Best way to provide "buckets" to post non-project time to in MSP2007/Server

[anovak]

We wish to post time against projects, track non-project time
(operational tasks - DBA Maint, HR Sys Maint, Administration, etc.)
and non-work (Vacation, Sick, Jury Duty or just "Non-Work"). We wish
for this to be done in a single place.

I realize you can set the Administrative stuff up at a high level, but
that is used within Timesheets only (vs. My Tasks). I suppose you
can also post time against project activity within Timesheets, but
remaining time is not available within Timesheets and its my
understanding that in order for project updates to calculate correctly
against the plans, it is important that not only hours per day but
also remaining time should be entered (I keep harping on this only
because best practice at one time was to enter remaining time as well
as hours worked on the timesheet).

Also, I've heard of three different ways in order to setup Operational
buckets for posting time against

1. Create a Resource Plan to use in conjunction with an Enterprise
Project
2. Create a Resource Plan to use in conjunction with an Activity Plan
3. Create an Enterprise Project and tweak it so that it acts like the
old "Administrative" project (per MSProjectExperts FAQ for MSP 2003).

Could someone please comment on the best way to setup a mechanism
report project time, operational/admin time, and non-work time in one
place in such a way that project updates result in an accurate
representation of the current status?

Thanks,
Andy Novak
UNT

 

[RickD]

Administrative projects consist of one or more tasks that will correspond to
your operational buckets. They are what I call rolling tasks. They have a
defined start but no finish. Folks that need to post their time do so against
the appropriate bucket. If they did not perform work on a specific bucket,
they do not report time. They also do not adjust "Remaining Work" for Admin
tasks.

On a regular project task, a person is not obliged to adjust Remaining Work
but it is an effective communication tool to the PM to advise when a person
will fullfill their assignments early or late. It is also the best method of
closing out a task that is complete. If every person assigned to a task
identifies if they are complete, it removes the problem of Remaining Work
left on a task when in fact the task is complete.

 

[anovak]

Administrative projects consist of one or more tasks that will correspond to
your operational buckets. They are what I call rolling tasks. They have a
defined start but no finish. Folks that need to post their time do so against
the appropriate bucket. If they did not perform work on a specific bucket,
they do not report time. They also do not adjust "Remaining Work" for Admin
tasks.

On a regular project task, a person is not obliged to adjust Remaining Work
but it is an effective communication tool to the PM to advise when a person
will fullfill their assignments early or late. It is also the best method of
closing out a task that is complete. If every person assigned to a task
identifies if they are complete, it removes the problem of Remaining Work
left on a task when in fact the task is complete.
--
Richard G. Dancer & Associates, Inc.










- Show quoted text -

Rick,

By defined Start and no Finish, do you mean an Actual Start defined
but no actual finish defined?
Is it required to "reserve" the time for the folks assigned to one or
more of these tasks? If you assigned the same person to more than
one of these rolling tasks, even the smallest of % unit adds up. Not
sure what to use there.

I thought Remaining Work is the key for the project updates
(rescheduling tasks) during the course of the work.

Could you show a real world example of this technique?

Thanks,
Andy Novak
UNT

 

[RickD]

My apologies for the delay and I expect you have already figured it out.

When I referred to "no finish" it is because of the notion of a rolling
task. When you first define the Admin buckets, they are still tasks with the
default 1? day but Project Server treats them differently because they tasks
belong to an Admin project. They will have a start and finish of whatever day
you define them.

You do not have to "reserve time" for the resources assigned to the admin
tasks because that is variable by definition. You merely assign the resources
to the tasks. The default assignment is 100%. You can assign the same
resource to multiple buckets (or admin tasks).

You do not (cannot) manage or update remaining work for admin tasks. It
makes no sense because of the "rolling" effect. The task keeps going because
whenever a person logs time against it, the task is updated with the actual
time spent during the period and the finish date is changed to reflect the
latest date any person reported time against it.

for example, when you first define a bucket such as Database Admin, the task
will be 1? day duration. For this example, the task (bucket) started October
1st. You assign John Doe to the bucket. One week later, John Doe spends 3
days on Database Admin work and fills in his timesheet to reflect 8 hours of
work each day for Oct 8, 9 & 10th. When the update is posted, the Admin task
Database Admin will be changed and it will show a start of October 1 and an
end of October 10 but actual work will be 0 hours for Oct 1-7, and 8 hours
for Oct 8-10. There is no Remaining Work and no forecast (Work).

I hope I haven't confused you more.